Gag or Guzzle: Oregon's Budget Solution

With money-signs where their eyes should be legislators in Oregon have set their sights on brewers in the state. These lawmakers [hereby dubbed Oregonards] bring new meaning to the phrase "sin tax". For one thing, the amount they want to raise taxes is a sin-- 1,900%! Have you ever heard of such an astronomically large leap in taxes (this one 'aint based on inflation kiddies)? Second, it's a sin to raise taxes on production during a glorified depression! And lastly, the reason this could be called a sin tax is because they plan to use the funds to make up for their sins! The Oregonards are so inept at doing their jobs they let the deficit in the state budget bloat up to around $800 million. Rather than take their lumps and the proper amount of blame, they are simply going to steal the profits of businesses in the state.

As noted in this blog post, Oregon *was* a particularly attractive home for breweries thanks to some of the lowest state taxes in the country. If the tax hike is approved however, I'm almost certain that Oregon would have one of the highest tax rates on barrels. If I was a brewer I wouldn't take this shit. I'd put the millions of dollars this that would have gone toward the new tax and get my ass to a different, business friendlier state. Thing is, most lawmakers only think in my-term length. As long as they look good in "their term" and get reelected or get out scot-free they don't care what happens in the future. Hopefully their tax results in many many scots for legislators: very scot-ful. (Ironically, the expression scot-free comes from an old english word related to taxes)

Hopefully this will backfire quickly and result in a hangover that the Oregonards will feel for years.

This idea stinks like skunk and has one hell of a nasty aftertaste. = Gag